90 



derive its name from a modern philosopher. Pytha- 

 goras, Philolaus, Nicetas of Syracuse, Plato, Aristar- 

 ehus, and many others among the ancients, have in a 

 thousand places expressed this opinion ; and Diogenes 

 Laertius, Plutarch, and Stobajus, have with great 

 precision transmitted to us their ideas. And that this 

 system was no sooner universally received, ought in- 

 iirely to be ascribed to the force of prejudice ; which, 

 deciding every thing by appearances, prefers sense to 

 reason, and abandons whatever is not conformable to 

 the judgment of the former. 



3. Pythagoras thought the earth was a moveable 

 body, and, so far from being the centre of the 

 world, performed its revolutions around the region of 

 fire, that is, the sun, and thereby formed day and 

 night, it is said he obtained this knowledge among 

 the Egyptians, who represented the sun emblematical- 

 ly by a beetle, because that iasect keeps itself six 

 months underground, and six above; or, rather be- 

 cause haying formed its dun^ into a ball, it afterwards 

 lays itself on its back, and, by means of its feet, 

 whirls that ball round in a circle. 



4. Some impute this opinion to Philolaus, the dis- 

 ciple of Pythagoras ; but it U evident, he had the 

 merit only of being the publisher of it, and several 

 other opinions belonging to that school : for Eusebius 

 expressly affirms, tfcat he was the first who put Pytha. 

 goras's system into writing. Philolaus added, that 

 the earth moved in an oblique circle ; by which no 

 doubt, he meant the zodiac. 



6. Aristarehtt-s of Samos who lived about three cen- 

 turies before Jesus Christ, was one of the principal 

 defenders of the doctrine of the earth's motion. Archi- 

 medes, in his book, de Arenario, informs us, u that 

 Aristarchus, writing on this subject against some of 

 the philosophers of his own age, placed the sun im* 

 moveable in the centre of a-u orbit, described by the 



